Australia is well past the "loosing its way" stage; it has lost its way. Any population that allows itself to be governed by the likes of the appalling Albanese regime, with less than 30% of the primary vote, deserves everything it gets. And, while people see everything only through their personal hobby-horses, and ignore the overall rot, we will stay lost.

We could save all his angst by going to 100% plantation timber since we're now a quarter way into the 21st century. We're supposed to eat less meat and dairy so old farms can provide the land. It's not just timber but biodiversity, carbon sequestration and catchment filtering provided by native forest. Structurally sound timber can be made by laminating young thin plantation trees so no need to topple forest giants to get truss beams for example.

Having said that there is now an issue with non-maintenance of forestry roads such as in the Tasmanian Florentine valley. Tourists love those drives but hate the sight of clear felling. Timber is arguably the least valuable aspect of old forests.

Native peoples have been selectively harvesting their forests without harm to either flora or fauna.

Timber stores carbon while either horizontal or vertical. Young growth forests store more carbon than old growth forests. And here I am not referring to seedlings!

Timber ceases to store carbon if burnt or decays/rots!

Selectively harvested forest with their natural fire breaks/logging roads help prevent runaway forest fires. As did manned lookout towers.

Runaway forest fires don't give a dam if they take out endangered species.

What was insane was clear felling native forests and importing it back as chipboard! Making a few fat cats seriously rich!

Mark's essay is scientifically sound in which he makes many inarguable points and is very hard to disagree with.

The greens have a hidden agenda that would end most development, destroy the economy and return us to the horse and cart era of the Middle Ages.

They would keep their mobile phones, tablets and laptops. Solar panels, wind turbines and modern medicine.

Given how much plastic is involved in these. How would they replace that? And to live as they want, each family would need a minimum forty acres for food production and another forty as a perpetually harvested woodlot.

Of course, it's an insane aspiration as are the folks who are a couple of sheep short in the top paddock and yearn for a return to the horse and cart and artisan era.

But they have votes and prey on young and vulnerable minds in our classrooms where they and their insane views are seriously overrepresented.

If we cannot selectively log nor return to the Middle Ages, we Absolutely Must embrace nuclear technology!
Alan B.

Instead of complaining, why not make a positive contribution?
Do something to correct the apparent imbalance?
I would suggest the very first thing is to put TRUTH back in to society.
I am interested in how you might go about doing this?
Far too many people have faulty principles underpinning the life they lead.
This makes them unable to cope with disaster or other emotional upheavals.
They fall in a heap when there is trouble.
But they are human.
And healthy mental processes could guide them well.
So; being more positive might be better for everyone?

If we go on as we are, we will need more and more energy to support our burgeoning lifestyle.
The reality is; we cannot go on doing this.
There is a practical limit to how much energy we can create.
So clearly we must lessen our reliance on raw energy.
We must become more efficient in the way we use what we have.
And change the way we live so we don't need as much.
I think a simpler lifestyle is on the horizon.
And we must soon embrace it.
Or it will be forced upon us.

Taswegian
My article refers to "misguided belief in easy alternatives" -- the notion of replacing high quality native forest hardwood with plantation-grown wood is one of those.

It is not easy primarily because of the requirement for land of good quality. In fact, we only have a plantations industry because initially, state governments freely allowed forested public lands to be cleared and converted to plantations (mostly softwood pine) from the 1960s - 80s; and later, because investing in trees was given tax deductibility status raising huge $$ that could be used to purchase farmland at above market prices (mid 1990s - 2010). Nowadays, neither of these land acquisition mechanisms is acceptable politically or socially.

So, the only option is to now try to buy already cleared land at market prices in a property climate where agriculture is far preferred because it provides an annual return and is therefore less risky, compared to forestry which requires substantial upfront capital then a decades long wait for returns with high risk attached due to the likelihood of bushfires, or other natural agents destroying or impairing tree growth to a point where returns are never realised.

Arguably, it is only governments that can invest (or make funding grants) under such risky circumstances, but there is a reluctance to do so given the scale of plantation area needed to produce equivalent wood volumes to that obtained from native forests.

As the article essentially points out, it would be common sense to avoid this by continuing to manage a small proportion of native forests for wood supply (as was already the case). As most forests are not used, huge areas can grow into old growth if conditions allow, plus there are other critically important benefits such as road and track access maintenance and fire prevention and control. But it seems political and environmental ideology trumps common sense in 21st Century Australia.